President Donald Trump on Thursday delayed plans to order the elimination of the federal Department of Education, a move that would likely face fierce opposition from Congress and in the courts.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt called reports that Trump would sign the order “fake news” and said no signing was immediately planned.

Aides said the White House was still working on “messaging” around a possible order and concerns that some Republicans might criticize it.

A draft of an executive order reportedly instructs newly confirmed Secretary of Education Linda McMahon to take all available steps “permitted by law” to close the sprawling department, which has more than 4,000 employees and an annual budget of $240 billion.

“The federal bureaucratic hold on education must end,” Trump’s planned order says, according to ABC News. “The Department of Education’s main functions can, and should, be returned to the states.”

The order would call for an end to the agency that it calls an “experiment of controlling American education through Federal programs and dollars” that has “failed our children, our teachers, and our families.”

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul denounced the potential elimination of the Education Department, saying it amounted to Trump’s trading funding a “math class” for “tax breaks for buddies at Mar-a-Lago.”

“(Education is) an investment in the future workforce,” Hochul said. “If we stop these investments now, then we’re basically saying we give up. We’re not even going to compete.”

State University of New York Chancellor John King, who served as education secretary in the Obama administration, ticked off a laundry list of school programs that could be cut, such as AP courses and after-school enrichment programs.

“This is exactly the wrong direction for the country,” King said.

Trump has long argued that the Department of Education is unnecessary and wasteful, calling it a “con job” on the presidential campaign trail last year.

It’s unclear whether Trump has the legal authority to eliminate the department, since it is funded by Congress, which controls the power of the purse under the Constitution.

The Department of Education has been a Cabinet-level department in the federal government since the 1860s. It took on its current form in 1980 in a reorganization engineered by former President Jimmy Carter.

McMahon, who won Senate confirmation Monday, said during her confirmation hearing that she believed eliminating the department would require congressional approval.

Hours after being confirmed, McMahon sent a message to staff titled “Our Department’s Final Mission,” in which she invited staff to embrace the phasing out of the agency.

“This is our opportunity to perform one final, unforgettable public service to future generations of students,” she said.

Republicans control both houses of Congress and the White House, but there could be significant resistance within the GOP to a vote to eliminate the Department of Education.

It’s unclear what would happen to some of the programs overseen by the department if it were eliminated, such as educational plans for special needs children and federal funding programs for K-12 schools that help support the education of students from low-income families and children with disabilities.

Funding for special needs children would likely be shifted to the Department of Human Services, while student loans could be administered by the Treasury Department.

Support for low-income students could be shifted to the states, but Congress would have to approve such a move.

Trump claims he has the right to shut down agencies via executive order. But critics say only Congress can do so because lawmakers have the power to fund the departments.

Trump has been hit with a blizzard of lawsuits over similar executive actions seeking to shutter USAID, the main federal agency funding American foreign assistance.

Courts have yet to definitively rule on the issue.

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